Your genetic makeup plays a big part in determining your size and weight. If both your parents are tall, there is a good chance you’ll be tall. But if your parents are smaller than average, you may want to rethink that professional basketball career!
The same goes for your body type. Have you ever heard someone say a person is “big boned?” It’s a way of saying the person has a large frame, or skeleton(骨骼). Big bones usually weigh more than small bones. That’s why it’s possible for two kids with the same height, but different weight, to both the right weight.
Being overweight can run in someone’s family, but it may not be because of their genes. Poor eating and exercise habits also run in families and these may be the reasons the members of a family are overweight. And even though some kids gain weight more easily than others, when they eat right and exercise, most kids can have a healthy weight that’s right for them. It’s true- the way you live can change the way you look.
How much your weight is a balance between the calories you eat and the calories you use. If you eat more calories than your body needs to use, you will gain too much weight. If you spend you free time watching TV, your body won’t use as many calories as it would if you played basketball, skated, or went for a walk. But if you eat more and exercise less, you may become overweight. On the other hand, if you eat less and exercise more, you may lose weight.
【小題1】 Which one can be used as the best title of this passage?

　 As we know, Human beings each have unique brains. The brain is of the greatest importance to the body. It is the boss of the body．Your eyes，ears，nose，and skin tell your brain what is going on around you．Other parts of your body tell your brain what is going on inside of you．Your brain takes in the signals．It tells your body what to do with them．When you touch fire，your skin tells your brain that your finger is too hot．Your brain tells you to move your finger．All these happen very fast．Your brain also controls your breathing，blinking，and heartbeat．It controls your feelings and thoughts too．
　　Humans have the most developed brain of all animals．Yet it is not the largest brain．The human brain weighs three pounds．The brain of an elephant weighs 11 pounds．So the largest brain is not always the best brain．In people，a larger brain does not mean a clever person．
【小題1】What is the main idea of this passage?
　 

Man has a big brain. He can think, learn and speak. Scientists thought that men are different from animals because they can think and learn. They know now that dogs, cats and birds can learn too. They are beginning to understand that. They make noises when they are afraid, or angry or unhappy. Apes(猿) can understand some things more quickly than human, one or two of them have learnt a few words. But they can not join words to make sentences. They can not think like us because they have no language. Language is a wonderful thing. Man has been able to build a modern world because he has language. Every child can speak his own language very well when he is four or five, —but no animal learns to speak. How do children learn it ? Scientists do not really know. What happens inside our body when we speak? They do not know. They only know that man can speak because he has a brain.
【小題1】The best title for this passage is          .

Do you ever run out of great books to read? So what should I read next? Is fast-paced crime fiction your thing?
Try the new Patricia Cornwell book, Scarpetta（Putnam）. She is such an able writer and handles complex forensic（法庭的） intelligence with ease. You need to be prepared, though, for the world you're entering—this isn't for the faint of heart, let's say.
If peace is more your thing, try Mary Pipher's wonderful new book, Seeking Peace: Chronicles of the Worst Buddhist in the World （Riverhead）. Mary is a lovely, comfortable writer who takes the reader through her personal awakening after reputation and fortune came her way. Even if you've never experienced life as a bestselling writer （as she has done, in her book years back, Reviving Ophelia）, you'll totally understand and sympathize with her renewed need for privacy, distance and quiet.
What if you want a straightforward, totally thrilling read with vivid characters, set about World War II? You cannot go wrong with Jim Lehrer's new novel, Oh, Johnny（Random House）, about a young Marine whose life is changed forever when he meets a woman on his way to war. His relationship with her lasts him through danger and hardship, and there's an impressive ending. See our interview with the productive novelist/newsman in the current issue of Reader's Digest （March, on stands now）, by the way, for insight into the very talented Mr. Lehrer and what interests him.
Well, what about something wickedly funny and totally offbeat? Does the name Carrie Fisher do anything for you? Try her vivid and new life in Hollywood and elsewhere, Wishful Drinking（Simon & Schuster）. Be prepared for humor as sharp as knives.
【小題1】 What does the writer want to tell us by the underlined sentence?

Are the lives of city kids the same as those in villages? In lots of ways, they are very different. But what are those differences?
Hu Peng from Wuhan and four of his friends decided to find out. Earlier this month, they went to live for a week in Caidian, a village near Wuhan. Hu and his Junior l classmates went door to door in Caidian and asked kids lots of questions. They want to learn more about village kids' everyday lives, so they asked questions like this: Do your parents teach you how to do the housework? How much money do you usually spend on dinner? What would you do if a thief came into your house? They also asked 150 city kids the same questions.
On April 12, the team gave a report to their class. They told about many differences between children's lives in cities and those of children in villages. The biggest difference is about independence. Hu's team found that 60 percent of city kids can't do much housework, but 90 percent of village kids can care for themselves.
City kids told Hu they care about schoolwork a lot, and they have no time for washing clothes or making their beds. Village kids said they help their parents a lot : cooking, cleaning the houses and feeding pigs. Hu's team  also found that village kids have less pocket money. Many have never used computers. They like playing in rivers or on mountains. Some don't even like to make new friends.
Hu and his friends said their trip gave them more self- confidence (自信) because they have done something by themselves. But it also worried them a bit because they found they still have a lot to learn. "When we grow up, our parents can't take care of us," Hu said. "We have to learn to take care of ourselves. "  Shen Guanquan, one of Hu's friends said, "When people learn to care for themselves, they learn to do lots of difficult things. "
【小題1】How many city kids went to learn about village kids' everyday lives?

A．help their parents a lot	B．have less pocket money
C．can take care of themselves	D．still have a lot to learn

A．visiting schools in the village

B．questioning village and city kids from door to door

C．watching village and city kids' everyday lives

D．questioning village and city kids' parents

Over the last 70 years, researchers have been studying happy and unhappy people and finally found out ten factors that make a difference. Our feelings of well-being at any moment are determined to a certain degree by genes. However, of all the factors, wealth and age are the top two.
Money can buy a degree of happiness. But once you can afford to feed, clothe and house yourself, each extra dollar makes less and less difference.
Researchers find that, on average, wealthier people are happier. But the link between money and happiness is complex. In the past half-century, average income has sharply increased in developed countries, yet happiness levels have remained almost the same. Once your basic needs are met, money only seems to increase happiness if you have more than your friends, neighbors and colleagues.
“Dollars buy status, and status makes people feel better,” conclude some experts, which helps explain why people who can seek status in other ways－scientists or actors, for example－may happily accept relatively poorly-paid jobs.
In a research, Professor Alex Michalos found that the people whose desire－not just for money, but for friends, family, job, health－rose furthest beyond what they already had, tended to be less happy than those who felt a smaller gap(差距). Indeed, the size of the gap predicted happiness about five times better than income alone. “The gap measures just blow away the only measures of income.” Says Michalos.
Another factor that has to do with happiness is age. Old age may not be so bad. “Given all the problems of aging, how could the elderly be more satisfied?” asks Professor Laura Carstensen.
In one survey, Carstensen interviewed 184 people between the ages of 18 and 94, and asked them to fill out an emotions questionnaire. She found that old people reported positive emotions just as often as young people, but negative emotions much less often.
Why are old people happier? Some scientists suggest older people may expect life to be harder and learn to live with it, or they’re more realistic about their goals, only setting ones that they know they can achieve. But Carstensen thinks that with times running out, older people have learned to focus on things that make them happy and let go of those that don’t.
“People realize not only what they have, but also that what they have cannot last forever,” she says. “A goodbye kiss to a husband or wife at the age of 85, for example, may bring far more complex emotional responses than a similar kiss to a boy or girl friend at the age of 20.”
【小題1】According to the passage, the feeling of happiness __________.

Watching bison up close is fascinating, like watching a grass fire about to leap out of control. With their huge, wedge-shaped heads and silver-dollar-size brown eyes, the 2,000-pound animals are symbols of another place and time. More than 100 bison now roam the 30,000-acre American Prairie Reserve in eastern Montana — the first time they’ve inhabited that region in a century. Direct descendants of the tens of millions of bison that once populated the Western plains, they represent an epic effort: to restore a piece of America’s prairie to the national grandeur that Lewis and Clark extolled two centuries ago. During that famous expedition across the Western states to the Pacific, the two explorers encountered so many bison that they had to wait hours for one herd to pass.
In order to protect what’s here and reintroduce long-gone wildlife (something the World Wildlife Fund is helping with), the American Prairie Foundation began purchasing land from local ranchers in 2004. It now owns 30,000 acres and has grazing privileges on another 57,000. Its goal over the next 25 years is to assemble three million acres, the largest area of land devoted to wildlife management in the continental United States.
Already, herds of elk, deer, and pronghorn antelope roam the grasslands, where visitors can camp, hike, and bike. Cottonwoods and willows are thriving along streams, creating habitats for bobcats, beavers, and other animals.
Not everyone shares APF’s vision. Some residents of Phillips County (pop. 3,904) worry that the area could become a prairie Disneyland, overcrowded with tourists. But the biggest obstacle is the ranchers themselves, whose cattle compete with prairie dogs and bison for grass and space.
“People like me have no intention of selling their ranches,” says Dale Veseth, who heads the Ranchers Stewardship Alliance of 35 families in Phillips County and whose family has been ranching here since 1886. “They’ve been a labor of love through the generations.” Instead, he wants APF to pay or subsidize ranchers to raise bison. This would be far less costly for the foundation, he argues, than buying the land directly.
【小題1】If you go to the American Prairie Reserve in eastern Montana, you will see ________.

Some people think that all wild animals are dangerous. Actually, very few of them will attack a man if he leaves them alone. If you met a lion or an elephant, suppose, you would run away, but even a lion will keep away from a man unless it is very hungry. Lions and tigers only kill and eat men when they have grown too old and too weak to catch their usual food, such as deer and other small animals. If you saw a wild elephant, perhaps you would be frightened. Elephants usually run away at once unless you attack them. Some animals get very frightened if they only smell a man; some take no notice at all but quietly walk in another direction. Wild animals only attack hunters when they are afraid that the hunters mean to harm their young ones, or then the hunters shoot at them and make them angry.
60. The word attack is closest in meaning to ________.
A. hurt         B. catch             C. hit             D. follow
61. Lions and tigers will not kill or eat men ________.
A. unless men try to run away                 B. if they are too old and too weak
C. if they are able to get enough of their usual food  D. however men act towards them
62. Some animals run away when they smell a man probably because _________.
A. they dislike the smell               B. they think men are dangerous to them
C. they don't want to eat men           D. they want to eat weak men
63. This passage is mainly about _________.
A. how to protect wild animals              B. how animals look for their food
C. how to make friends with wild animals     D. how animals act towards men

I will be traveling to Australia as a Student Ambassador with People to People. People to People arranges for American students to travel all around the world to learn about other cultures, and to help others understand American culture. The program was founded by former President Dwight D. Eisenhower to promote peace through understanding.
I had to put in many hours of special work to get to this point. First, a teacher nominated (推薦) me, and then I attended an informational meeting about the program. The application process included an interview, and finally, I was accepted.
That’s when the hard work really began. In addition to attending monthly meetings to prepare for the big trip, my parents encouraged my twin sister Beth (also participating in the program) and me to raise $ 2,000 each to help pay for the cost. And so the fund-raising began. We did everything from selling candy bars to selling an old car to decorating people’s mailboxes during the holiday season. We also babysat, washed cars, held a yard sale, and washed windows. After months of hard work I had raised a total of $2319.87! Combined, Beth and I raised over $ 4500.00!
Now I have a problem-packing. Yes, I know it sounds unimportant, but my suitcase seems to have shrunk (收縮) as I placed my belongings inside. According to airline regulations (規(guī)定), a suitcase can be no larger than 54 inches and weigh no more than 44 pounds. For a person who likes to wear a different outfit every day, packing all my clothes into such a small space seemed an impossible task. However, I have lessened my load and my suitcase which started out weighting overweight now checks in at a mere 36. Apart from a slightly bloated (臃腫) carry-on bag, my luggage is definitely manageable.
I doubt that I will not get much sleep tonight because I am so excited! I know that what lies ahead is going to be the trip of lifetime!
【小題1】When does the author write the passage?

If you don’t prepare yourself now, retirement may be some of the most boring and dull years of your life. To have a happy, fulfilling retirement, you need to start preparing right away.
The most obvious thing for people to do when they retire is to take up a hobby. The most important step to take before retiring, though, is to make sure that you actually have started some hobbies. Once you’re retired, unless you ‘ve already started a hobby, you’ll find it very hard to get into something new. Some hobbies aren’t for everyone. Think about what you enjoy doing and start participating on a casual basis now.
Another thing many people participate in is volunteering. Not only does volunteering give you something to do, it also gives you a sense of accomplishment(成就) and can add meaning to your life .Volunteering is also rewarding in other ways, too. There are hundreds of different types of volunteer services and you’ll always be able to meet new and interesting people. Also, don’t think that volunteering is always only about helping someone for free. Many companies pay their volunteers after they’ve had enough experience and prove themselves to be valuable workers.
There are plenty of other potions, as well. Going back to school is a great way to keep yourself feeling young. Taking a vacation around the world with your loved ones is another great way to spend your retirement.
Ultimately, though, the key to a happy retirement is simply keeping yourself busy and doing whatever you love. If there’s nothing you love doing now, then you’ll find that once you have a vast amount of free time, your life will be pretty empty. Now is the time to find out what you want to do when you retire.
【小題1】Why does the author suggest starting a hobby before retirement?